Hearing Without Listening
by episkey
Summary: This conversation was not going as Lee had imagined it would. Spoilers for the miniseries.


_Why don't you talk to me, Lee?_

Almost a plea. Lee had been working for years to compartmentalise his dealings with his father as much as possible. There had been so much pain that he'd learned to wall it off so that it didn't hurt him so much, and he'd been largely successful. After Zak's death, Lee's relationship with the Commander went from terse and strained to largely non-existent.

_You know, all the things you talked to me about the last time we were together... at the funeral, they still ring in my ears after two years._

The funeral. Memories almost hazy from the emotional strain of the day. Supporting his mother who had all but collapsed when the news of the crash came through and could barely stand at the funeral through a combination of grief and the alcohol she was using to try to deaden the desolation she was feeling over the loss of her youngest child.

The only memories of the day that stood out sharply were the ones where his own grief had joined with his frustration at seeing the man he held responsible for Zak's death being consoled and supported had overwhelmed his careful control and for once he'd told his father exactly what he was thinking. He remembered his satisfaction at seeing the old man visibly hurt by the barbs he'd thrown. Now his father was telling him that they'd stuck.

Good.

_Zak had a choice. You both did._

Some choice. The choice between trying to earn some approval from their absent father or feeling like they'd lost him completely. Whenever the Commander had seen them, on those rare occasions that he wasn't too taken up with fleet business, he'd drummed in to them that to be a real man they should be in the fleet. That _a man isn't a man until he wears the wings of a Viper pilot._ Zak had always chased his father's approval harder, maybe felt the loss of his father figure more... Lee wasn't sure. He just knew that Zak should never have been in that cockpit, and that without his daddy's interference he wouldn't have been.

_That's not fair, son._

Blindsided. This wasn't the way this confrontation had gone in all the times Lee had run through it in his head. Ever since the funeral he'd spent hours mapping out what he would say to his father if he were in the same room with him again. He'd expected anger, a shouting match. His father had a temper. All of the things that he had in his mind to say were almost designed to provoke it.

When he'd been given his orders to report to Galactica he'd hardly known what to think. In the long flight to Galactica he'd thought about almost except for what he'd say to the Old Man once he was finally in the same room again. The trip was routine, he only needed half his brain to fly, and the other half wandered over possible scenarios, but when he was finally on Galactica he'd changed his mind. He'd keep his father in his compartment in his brain. He'd be professional and do the job he was told to do and get the frak out of there before he said something that they'd both regret.

Then his father had pushed him and it had all come out.

But he'd never anticipated this reaction. He sounded almost sad.

And that pushed Lee right up to the edge. He could feel the walls around his worst thoughts about his father's involvement with Zak's death crumbling.

_That's an exaggeration. I did nothing for him that I wouldn't have done for anyone else._

Denial. His father was denying culpability again. He wasn't listening, he never listened. He as good as told Zak to go into the service, to be a flier, to be a man and then when he'd nearly fallen at the first hurdle, nearly failed to even get in to the academy the famous William Adama had pulled all the strings, made use of all the connections he had to get his brother, his sweet, funny brother with no feeling for flight in to flight school and that had killed him and here his father was, denying that his actions had had consequences.

The walls fell. The words came tumbling out almost before he could stop them.

_That'll be all, Captain._

Dismissal. His father had pushed until he'd said everything he'd wanted to say and now it was out there, but it didn't feel as good as he'd always felt it would. He'd regretted saying the words almost as soon as they were out. Not because he felt they were untrue but because the act of expressing them had left him feeling the same raw grief and anger that he'd experienced after Zak's death and then carefully boxed and channelled in to whatever he was supposed to be doing at a given time, becoming an excellent pilot and officer in spite of himself and his lack of enthusiasm for the job he found himself in.

In his mind saying the words _you killed him_ always made him feel better. In his mind he made his father understand what he'd done and made him suffer too, but now he realised that he was hurting at least as badly as he wanted his father to feel.

Now his father, who had used a professional occasion to push him to speak to him as a family member blurred the lines again and was dismissing him as a commander would a subordinate.

Nothing left in his mind now but grief and rage, but his training took over. Take the dismissal as he would from another officer. Get through the ceremony, get away from Galactica, finish his stint in the Colonial Fleet Reserves and he'd never need to speak to his father again.

The words were out. It was time to move on.


End file.
